Nonprofit News

You’re a mission-driven nonprofit professional ready to take the next step in your career. You start actively looking for a new job—attending networking events, talking to connections, applying online—and you land an interview for a position that checks all the boxes. How can you prepare for what’s next?

At its best, networking is all about creating and strengthening genuine human connections. Yes, it’s a means to advance your career and search for jobs, but networking can also provide a platform for peer learning, a source of candid advice, and a space for professional camaraderie.

Once you start incorporating simple networking habits into your life,it will seem more like a natural extension of your professional routine.

Recently, I wrote an article about the growing number of pay equity laws designed to correct gender- and race-based disparities in compensation. The post focused on California’s ban on asking about salary history and offered compensation policy advice for nonprofit executives navigating this evolving landscape.

Campbell & Company supports these legislative efforts, and we believe similar laws will continue to take shape across the U.S. While organizations seek guidance amidst this change, jobseekers need their own set of do’s and don’ts. How can I prepare? What can I ask? How much should I share?

On the Campbell & Company Executive Search team, we partner with nonprofits to recruit executive and leadership-level positions—which means my colleagues and I receive and assess scores of applications to mission-based organizations on a weekly basis. When it comes to application materials, one of the questions we hear most often is: “Should I include a cover letter with my resume?” The simple answer is YES!

To assist nonprofit leaders in their pursuit of the right position, our team has identified five other cover letter FAQs. Read on for our responses, based on our decades of combined experience in the field and our daily work with exceptional candidates.

In 2017, a LinkedIn profile is a necessity for all nonprofit leaders—absence from the professional networking site can raise a bigger red flag than even the weakest profile. A recent CareerBuilder study found that employers are 57 percent less likely to interview a prospect who doesn’t have an online presence.[1] In many ways, LinkedIn functions as a professional fingerprint. Executive search consultants use LinkedIn to research candidates, confirm work experience, and find contact information. Beyond these basic functions, LinkedIn also provides a means to gauge a candidate’s overall professionalism and sophistication. A sharp profile can make a lasting impression on a search consultant. To this end, my colleagues and I mined our broad experience working with top candidates and put together six recommendations to help nonprofit leaders get noticed on LinkedIn.

Since joining Campbell & Company’s Executive Search practice six years ago, I have reviewed countless resumes for nonprofits across the U.S. For any given search I’m working on, I receive dozens of resumes, some better than others. There is a lot of advice out there about how to craft a strong resume, and much of it is conflicting, not to mention confusing. Recently, more people have been asking me for advice on their resume – even at the end of an interview, which they got because I liked what I saw on their resume.